Diablo IV Quarterly Update – March 2022

This year’s first quarterly update for Diablo IV is dedicated to the various facets of the game’s environment design, be it art direction, open world design, or dungeon design (of which the game will have over 150). Due to the update’s impressive scope, here’s just the introductory message from the game’s director Joe Shely, and you take things from there:

Hello and welcome to the first Diablo IV Quarterly Update of 2022. We hope you enjoyed last quarter’s update on systems, itemization, and visual effects. That blog and our previous updates are available if you missed out.

I’m struck by how much the game has evolved since our first blogs. It’s difficult for these updates to showcase all the work our engineers, designers, artists, QA team, and producers have done–how do you show a bug that doesn’t happen anymore, or explain how the planning in a burn-down chart resulted in a feature making it into the game instead of getting cut? While you can’t see those things, you can see how systems like itemization and skill trees have evolved, incorporating your feedback and internal testing along the way. You can also see how much closer we’re getting to our artistic and thematic targets of dark, low-fantasy gothic horror. And keep in mind the images you’ll see today still represent a work in progress!

Many artists need to work together to deliver Diablo IV with the top-tier visual quality we can be proud of and the promise of an immersive world you can wander through and enjoy getting lost in. The seamless game you play is a composition of many layers of art and visualization, from lighting, to environments, to props and interactives. Today we have artists from many of these layers here to talk about their craft and everything that goes into building the world of Sanctuary.

We hope you enjoy this update and look forward to your thoughts and reactions. We have exciting things to share this year, and we’re grateful to have you with us on this journey.

Thank you for playing the games we make, and without further ado, artists!

-Joe Shely,
Game Director, Diablo IV